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Chateaubriand, Bigelow
Neatly trim a little fat from a two-pound piece tender filet of beef. Envelop it in upright position in a towel, then with a cleaver flatten it to one and a half inches in thickness. Mix on a plate a tablespoon oil, teaspoon salt and half teaspoon pepper, repeatedly roll chateaubriand in it and broil on slow fire for ten minutes on each side. Remove and place the chateaubriand in a small roasting pan, squeeze over the juice of half a sound lemon, baste with a little melted butter, then set in oven for ten minutes, being careful to baste once in a while, remove and keep hot.
Cut from a sandwich loaf twelve round pieces a quarter inch thick and an inch in diameter and place on a tin. Cut an ounce raw beef marrow in twelve equal pieces, plunge in hot water for three minutes, lift up with skimmer and arrange over the twelve pieces of bread. Sprinkle over a half teaspoon salt, set in oven for eight minutes, then remove. Finely slice twelve canned mushrooms and one small truffle, place in small saucepan with two tablespoons sherry and a gill tomato sauce and let reduce on fire to one-third the quantity. Prepare a Bearnaise sauce and add sauce to it, mix well with a spoon, then pour on a hot dish. Place chateaubriand over, arrange toasts around, sprinkle a little finely chopped parsley over all and serve.
A Delmonico-style presentation of a center-cut filet: broiled, finished in the oven, and set on a mushroom-and-truffle béarnaise with marrow toasts. The one thing to fix is the cooking time, which will take a 1½-inch filet well past where anyone wants it today.
- Total cooking timeTen minutes a side on the grill plus ten in the oven is roughly triple what a 1½-inch filet needs. Work to internal temperature instead: about 125-130F for rare to medium-rare, which usually means 4-5 minutes a side over a hot fire and a brief rest, with the buttering and lemon done off the heat.
- "Slow fire"In a coal-broiler kitchen this most likely meant a bed past its first fierce flare rather than a low flame. On a modern grill or under a broiler, use high direct heat and shorten the time rather than trying to reproduce a gentle fire.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given; period ranges rarely carried a usable thermometer. Treat the basting step as hot and brief: 400-425F.
- A gillHalf a cup. So half a cup of tomato sauce with two tablespoons sherry, reduced to about a third, roughly three tablespoons of concentrated liquid to fold into the béarnaise.
- Flattening in a towelThe towel keeps the meat from tearing and the cleaver clean; the flat of a heavy knife or a small skillet does the same. Aim for even thickness across the whole piece, not thin edges and a thick middle, or the ends overcook.
- Beef marrowAn ounce of raw marrow means marrow scooped from a split marrow bone, which a butcher will cut for you. Soaking the bones in cold water makes it easier to push out. Three minutes in hot water firms the cut pieces just enough to hold their shape.
- Canned mushrooms and truffleCanned button mushrooms were a common item in restaurant kitchens of the period. Fresh cremini, sliced thin and sweated dry first, give more flavor. The truffle is optional; a teaspoon of truffle paste or a few drops of truffle oil stirred in at the end is closer than nothing at all.
- The toastsOne-inch rounds a quarter-inch thick, cut from a fine-crumb sandwich loaf, are meant as a border of twelve small bites. A round cutter or a small glass works. They will darken quickly in a 400F oven, so watch them.
- YieldTwo pounds of trimmed filet serves three, generously four, carved across the grain on the diagonal at the table.
Chateaubriand is generally traced to the household of François-René de Chateaubriand, the writer and diplomat, and traditionally credited to his cook Montmireil in the 1820s; the name attached itself first to a thick cut from the heart of the filet and then to the whole dressed presentation. The second half of the title is a period habit rather than a place: it was common for restaurant cooks of the era to attach surnames to dishes, though what "Bigelow" marks here is not established by the page itself. The dish as written is pure late-Victorian restaurant cooking — marrow croutons, canned mushrooms, a shaving of truffle, and béarnaise sharpened with a tomato-and-sherry reduction — the sort of plate that justified a filet's price by the number of separate preparations set around it.